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.<<perhaps some reference to Rowen's computations of income loss>>
.<<perhaps a reference to counterproductive conservation>>
.<<encourages the anti-energy sentiments>>
.CB EXTREME CONSERVATION

(paper given at the Colloquium on Contingency Planning for an
Energy Emergency, June 16-18, 1980 held at Stanford University
and sponsored by Scientists and Engineers for Secure Energy (SE%42%1)
and the Hoover Institution)


	This paper discusses the conservation measures that would
be necessary in case of the possible prolonged cutoff of
Middle East oil that is the subject of this Colloquium.
One of my qualifications for giving the paper is that
I am not an enthusiast for conservation.  Quite the contrary; I
believe we can and should produce all the energy anyone will want
to buy.  The quasi-religious emphasis that has been given
to conservation since 1973 has had a large cost in reduced attention
to innovation and productivity, and it has helped prevent the
production measures required to solve our energy problem.

	However, a prolonged halt in Middle East oil exports would require some
severe and unpleasant measures of conservation.  They should be
regarded as temporary, and their design should support a production
mobilization aimed at making them temporary.

	The necessary severity depends on the magnitude and duration of
of the cutoff and on demands for energy apart from normal American
civilian demands.  We shall not take into account possible damage
to our internal energy production by hostile action.
On this basis, the maximum shortage we need to consider amounts to
a complete cutoff of imports together with a need to export half
our internal production of oil in order to keep our allies alive.
The shortage would be assumed to last until we and our allies can
produce our way out of the crisis.
We shall also consider a cutoff of imports without a need to export
and a cutoff of half our imports.

	A full plan for dealing with such shortages would establish
a correspondence between
amounts of shortage and specific measures of conservation.
Determining this correspondence would be a substantial many person
research project, so I will have to
treat successively more severe conservation measures qualitatively.
The general level of hardship would be worse than that suffered by
American civilians during World War II, but it might not be as bad
as that suffered by British civilians, and wouldn't be as bad as that
suffered by civilians in occupied Europe.

	Most participants
in this conference will agree that our energy problems today have a mainly
political origin.  If we had had the political will, we could have
carried out Project Independence.  We might still be importing oil,
but it would be because importing was cheaper than producing all
our own energy requirements, and the price of oil would be
affected by our ability to meet our needs if necessary.
If we had the political will now, we could still achieve substantial
independence in a relatively short time.

	Most likely the American public would react to a sudden oil
cutoff as it reacted to the attack on Pearl Harbor.  This would allow
actions to be taken that the present political situation doesn't even
permit including in contingency plans.
We cannot be entirely sure of this, and the reaction to a slow cutoff
might resemble that of France to the beginning of World War II.
Therefore, this paper will treat political as well as
technical aspects of managing a crisis.

.skip 2
THE TECHNOLOGICAL NATURE OF A CRISIS

	Should we lose our imports of oil and have to export half our own,
this would reduce us to 64.4 percent of our present energy use.  Our per
capita energy use would then correspond to that of the year 1950.  Not
having to export would bring us only back to 1965, and if we need only
halve our imports, we are at 1968.  Of course, the disruption of our
economy would be much worse than these figures indicate, because the
different sources of energy are not completely substitutable.

	In all but oil the U.S. is either self-sufficient or
almost all the imports are from Canada and Mexico.  Oil has
substitutes except for transportation, and if we could fully replace it
in non-transportation uses, we would be nearly self-sufficient (not
counting any possible need to supply allies).

	Oil is used for four main purposes:
transportation (52 percent), industrial (20 percent), heating homes
and businesses (19 percent) and generating electricity (10 percent).
While replacing oil as transportation fuel is a long term proposition,
it is economically replacable by nuclear energy and coal for generating
electricity as fast as plants can be built or converted, and somewhat
less economically replacable by electricity for heating (with or
without heat pumps).

	California generates about 60 percent of its electricity
by burning oil, while Illinois gets only about 6 percent from oil.
This means that the emergency programs in different parts of the
country will differ.  Presumably in Illinois, it will be desirable
in an emergency to replace some oil heating by electric heating
and economize on some other applications of electricity, while in
California that wouldn't be appropriate.

.skip 2
DEALING WITH SHORTAGES

	Enthusiasts for conservation often emphasize long term
measures, because they regard reduced use of energy as a good
in itself and wish to promote "a more healthy life style".  Many
of these measures are irrelevant to an acute crisis.  For example,
making more fuel-efficient cars can have an effect over the 10 year
life-cycle of American cars, but the best short term measure may
be to manufacture no cars at all for the duration of the crisis
in order to divert manpower, energy and other resources into energy
production facilities.

	In the following list of conservation measures, we shall try
to estimate how quickly each can be put into effect.

.skip 2
HOME HEATING

The possible reactions to a severe shortage of heating oil are the
following in approximate order of severity:

.item←0
#. Reduction of thermostat settings.  This can be done immediately
at the onset of a crisis if people are willing, but simply
jawboning harder will have a limited effect.  Fuel rationing
accompanied by estimates of the thermostat setting needed to live
within the ration will do more.  Each local area should keep
published in the newspapers, the estimated fraction of the
oil consumption for the current heating season in the circulation
areas covered by the newspaper that should have
been consumed to date, so that a householder can tell whether he has
over-consumed up to a given point and will have to conserve harder.
Relating oil consumption to the mildness or severity of the
winter can then be done locally.

	Improvement of insulation is being encouraged today.
Its effective use beyond what is being done at present
seems to be intrinsically a long term proposition
depending on new housing or substantial remodeling.
Moreover, present insulation programs are creating severe problems
of indoor air pollution which can be fixed only by introducing
countercurrent heat exchangers on ventilating systems.  These aren't
available in the U.S. at present, but presumably they will be 
available soon.

#. Cutting off some rooms in homes.  Many people will require help
in adjusting their heating systems to do this and will take some time
to convince themselves that this is better than running out of fuel
ration.  Many people who do run out of their ration will be coercible
into cutting off rooms in order to get a supplemental ration.  Therefore,
it will take most of a heating season for this
measure to take effect.

#. Increased use of fireplaces and stoves.  While firewood is probably quite
limited as a long term resource, there are many forests that can be
harvested for a several year emergency.  Firewood will be more available in
usable only in certain regions of the country, and its use is very
labor-intensive compared to other energy sources.
The use of coal in fireplaces and stoves has the supply
advantage that the amount that can be used is limited by
the size of the fireplaces and stoves and the time the household is
willing to put in keeping them going.  The effectiveness of fireplaces
can be enhanced by suitable stove-like inserts.  Such
use of coal would restore to some extent living conditions that existed
before the widespread adoption of central heating.  Coal distribution
could be established within days.  The companies now distributing oil
would only have to hire other trucks and more people.
We can also expect many house fires especially at first before knowledge
of the necessary precautions is widespread.
Perhaps many older apartment buildings can be reconverted to coal, but
this will require more manpower for stoking and carrying out ash.  If
the cutoff causes substantial unemployment, the manpower will be available.

	The resulting
pollution, like that endured before widespread conversion to oil stoves
(1920s and 1930s?), will have a certain ironic appropriateness, since
it will be caused in a substantial degree by the success of the
environmentalists in hampering new energy sources.  Unfortunately, we
will all suffer for their success.

#. Increased use of small electric heaters.  Many of these are already
in the hands of consumers, and they are a convenient way of supplementing
low thermostat settings to achieve local comfort.  Most likely, they
save oil compared to a higher thermostat setting
when used in moderation even when the electricity is
generated by burning oil, since they heat people sitting
near them rather than a whole room.

	Spot oil shortages or price or rationing may force some people to
do without central heating.  They will have to rely on coal or wood stoves
or electric heaters.  Small electric heaters are very prevalent in English
homes with bad or no central heating and they can be manufactured and sold
in a hurry.  When businesses turn down the thermostats, they are the
immediate reaction of the secretaries.

#. Increased use of electricity for central heating.  In parts of
the country generating electricity from nuclear and coal plants and with
poor electric interties, present users of electric central heating may
suffer very little in the short run.  In the medium run, they will have to
share their electricity with the increased use of small electric heaters,
and as more nuclear and coal capacity is introduced, more people should be
encouraged to convert to resistance heating and heat pumps as a long term
solution.  It would seem that installation of electric heating would be
limited more by electric supply than by ability to perform the
installations.  Where electricity is generated from oil, the problem is
greater, and electricity rationing may force users of central electric
heating to convert to small local heaters.  However, resistance heating
systems are modifiable within days to heat only part of a house.  Since
electric heating is probably the long term solution anyway, we can
visualize the crisis ending gradually by increased rations, the eventual
end of rationing and declining real prices for electricity.

#. Temporary abandonment of housing that their users
cannot afford to heat.  One
use we Americans have made of our prosperity is to increase the number
of households.  Children move out of their parents' homes younger.  Old
people maintain their independence longer.  Couples with differences
separate more readily.

	A shortage of heat would temporarily
reverse this development.  In nineteenth
century literature, we often read that old people could not maintain
their homes without someone to cut firewood for them.  This process
can be repeated.  In many countries today,
it is rare for young people to acquire apartments or houses until marriage and
difficult right after marriage.  Some other countries have more sharply
age-related salary structures than we do, so that young workers can only
afford to live in dormitories.  Moving towards such a structure,
for example by heating subsidies restricted to families, might
cause a large saving.
Judging from observation in Britain, most families will prefer
shivering to crowding and will make do with closing rooms and
crowding around the fireplace rather than share apartments.

#. Evacuating  some people to a warmer climate.
  It seems to me that this wouldn't
be called for in any likely emergency, but one could imagine
evacuating children and other dependents to areas with a warm climate
or not dependent on oil for heating, while essential workers would
live in dormitories near their work.

	Some acceleration of the existing tendency for retired people to
move to warmer climates would be expected.  Indeed an oil cutoff would
accelerate migration to parts of the country with mild climates.  Probably
there are other phenomena like this - a possible spontaneous adaptation to
changed circumstances that will reduce the need for government action.

	The unpleasantness, inconvenience and pollution resulting from
all the above measures, which will be found preferable to freezing,
will generate and maintain support for crash programs
for energy production.

.skip 2

INDUSTRIAL USE

	After transportation, the largest consumer of oil is industry.
A severe oil cutoff will require the temporary cessation of some
industrial activities.  From the point of view of the products of
industry this may not be so serious, because we can do without the
products of many industries for a long time, because we are already
so well supplied.  For example, no civilian passenger cars were
produced during World War II, and our 150 million registered vehicles
would last a long time without much hardship.  We could also make our
TVs and stereos and major household appliances last a long time.

	Since industry cannot afford to pay workers if they can't
manufacture, the specter is unemployment.  This may indeed be the
problem, but it should be mitigated by industrial and construction
mobilization for the production of energy facilities - perhaps using
somewhat less energy intensive means of producing these facilities
than if there weren't a crisis, e.g. the workers may have to live
in barracks rather than commute from their homes.  Expanded use of
coal will also create jobs - unpleasant ones.

	A severe energy cutoff will force a reduction in standard of
living, but many people are legally protected against reductions in
standard of living by cost of living clauses in labor contracts and
in laws governing transfer payments.  The best way to deal with this
is by passing a law reducing the standard of living - namely a law
that say that all payments regulated by escalator clauses will go
up only half as fast as the rate of inflation until the required
reduction is realized.

.skip 2
TRANSPORTATION

	Transportation offers the greatest problems from an oil
cutoff, since most of our petroleum is used in transportation.
The following measures must be considered:
.item←0

	#. Restrictions on pleasure driving enforced by gasoline
rationing and/or high prices.  In so far as the driving is recreational,
obviously high prices are the better solution.

	#. Enforced car pooling by giving rations to pools.
There is a tendency to regard car-pooling as a virtue in itself,
but we should not lose sight of its costs to the individual in
enforcing a rigid schedule without side trips to run errands.

	#. Increased buses and other public transportation.

	#. Forcing people to move closer to their work by
restrictions on transportation.

	#. Provision of dormitories near work or connected to it
by buses for young or other low status workers.

	#. Encouraging hitchhiking, perhaps by issuing people who
rate it, "certificates of respectability".

	#. Commuters would pay a premium for existing small cars.

	#. Many businesses would switch to a four day work week.

	#. Stores might arrange fuel-efficient delivery routes -
at the cost to the customer of slow delivery.

	#. There would be further increased use of motorcycles and mopeds.

	If we could use all petroleum for transportation, our domestic
resources would almost suffice provided export of oil were not
required, so conserving oil in its other applications is very
important.

.skip 2
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

	There are two ways of determining the effects of a severe
energy crunch and how it might be affected by policies.  One is to
work it out "mathematically" using statistics of population, energy
sources, etc.  The other is to look at our less affluent past and
the present of less affluent countries.  Most likely we will find
substantial variations among countries at the same level of availability
of domestic energy, but predictions far outside the envelope of
other countries should be discounted.

.skip 2
SUBSTITUTING COMMUNICATION AND COMPUTATION FOR TRAVEL AND COMMUTING


	Many thinkers have proposed that much of the travel and
commuting people do is unnecessary and can be replaced by
electronic communication and that computers make this much
easier.  We shall consider what could be done in this direction
as an emergency measure following an oil cutoff.

	1. Many face-to-face meetings can be replaced by conference
telephone calls.  People don't like conference calls very much, but
the few times I have tried to use them, they have done the job, and
no-one felt the need for a face-to-face meeting.
There is sufficient telephone capacity so that a policy of permitting
only essential travel as in World War II would work well.  Organizations
would have to decide which meetings would be replaced by conference
calls.  Most likely the formal agenda of this conference could be
handled by a large conference call, but it is doubtful that people
could get acquainted that way, and for many of us, getting acquainted
is a major value of the meeting.  Therefore, regular meetings are
a better candidate for such replacement.

	2. A more elaborate version of the conference call called
teleconferencing in which the participants have video terminals as
well as telephones has been the subject of successful experiments.
In some cases, the ability to communicate with the chairman without
interrupting the current speaker makes the teleconference even more
effective than a face-to-face meeting.  Teleconference facilities
are today rather ill-defined, but I would suppose that the experts in
it could make proposals for a standard system that could be implemented
by the telephone companies in less than a year.

	3. Much office work could be done at home with suitable
home terminals connected to office computers.  The terminals are
available and their rate of manufacture could easily be increased.
However, relatively few offices do their main work through computer
terminals, and the system design and programming
required to convert many offices of
many different businesses would take several years after a commitment to convert
at present development pace.   With the urgency of an emergency, it
might be done faster, but learning about new ways of doing office
work would
compete with other urgent learning tasks.

	Offices whose main
work involves the production of documents might be the most
straightforward candidate for conversion.  A system adequate for
a law office of 10 to 40 lawyers might be based on a Digital Equipment
Corporation VAX computer and would cost from α$150,000 to α$200,000.
Extensive use of the telephone would also be required.
A suitable system for law offices could be adapted from present
time-sharing systems about as fast as educational material could
be written.  The system would also do for many government offices
as well.  Once the system was in place, there might only be one
or two days a week when people would come in to the office.

	4. Another function that could be carried out at home is
that of telephone information operator or reservation clerk or
order taker using a computer system.  Such a system, employing people
who would work at home, would be economical today, since it could
obviate a need to expand rented office space in many cases.
Such systems could be implemented in a month in many cities where
there is enough spare telephone capacity.  The main problem would
be adapting the supervisory and training systems.

	While a crisis would speed the development of such systems,
they will occur anyway, and if they are instituted during a crisis,
many of them would be retained after the crisis was over.

.skip 2
THE POLITICAL SETTING OF THE CRISIS

.item←0
	We make the following suppositions regarding the setting of the crisis:

	#. The crisis is caused by enemies who cut off our imports.

	#. We undertake to share our own supplies of oil with allies
who have no domestic production.

	#. No substantial part of the American population regards the
crisis as our own fault and supports our enemies.

	#. Wishful thinking that the crisis will soon be over is
prevalent, but the President finds it prudent to act as if the cutoff were
permanent.

	#. The belief that we cannot produce our way out of the crisis
will be widespread and will require determined efforts by our political
leadership to overcome.  Since 1973, this belief has played an
ideological role in support of the idea of basing our main energy policy
on doing with less energy.

	#. An industrial mobilization will be undertaken to build
energy facilities.  This mobilization will require many people to
change their jobs and will require giving essential activities
priority.  Some industries may suspend production of their conventional
products as the automobile industry suspended production of passenger
cars during World War II.
Colleges and universities also constitute a vast reservoir of manpower.

	#. Sacrifices will necessarily be uneven.  No plan can be
devised that everyone will regard as fair, and there won't be time
to work out a plan that representatives of all groups in society
will regard as fair.  The most that can be expected is that the
top political leaders can be regarded as trying to be fair.
Most people will grumble that some other group has done better but
will accept the result as "the breaks".

.SKIP 2
IDEOLOGY AND THE CRISIS

	There are two attitudes that would be taken towards the
conservation measures that might be necessitated by an oil cutoff.  One is
that they are a "punishment for our greediness" and that we need "tough"
laws and "strict" regulations so that we will be "frugal" in the future.
The other is that the crisis is temporary and is to be overcome by a crash
program to produce all the energy we need or even want.

	The issue between these two attitudes has a technological
component and an ideological component.   Perhaps we may also distinguish
a component involving individual values.  The technological issue
is whether there are technologies, economic resources, and management
skills that can put new energy production facilities in place in
a given time.  The rest of this conference is dedicated to this issue,
and I think it is clear that we can produce our way out of any
plausible crisis.

	The issue of individual values is whether an individual
prefers to pay the increased cost of our present consumption of energy
or prefers to live more frugally.  Obviously the answer will depend
on the individual, but I think it can be shown that in the present
as in the past and in America as in other countries, people mainly
migrate in the direction of the higher per capita GNP.
Given a choice, people will pay the cost of a high energy life style.

	A first look at how Americans have used the increase
since World War II in our ability to buy energy indicates that we have
used it reasonably well given the level of technology then available.
Increased mobility has made the choices of where to live and where
to work more independent and has permitted more freedom in recreation.
Larger and more housing has relieved crowding, made it possible for
the young to have their own apartments at an earlier age, has
made it possible for old people to retain their independence longer,
and has made it possible for couples who can't get along to separate.
From 1950 to 1976, the U.S. population multiplied by 1.43,
but housing units by 1.73.

	The ideological issue of what do do about an oil cutoff
is whether crash production programs, not crippled by regulatory
constraints should be taken, and whether the conservation measures
should be regarded as temporary or permanent.  One might suppose
that the outcome of the ideological issue should be the resultant
of the choices based on individual values, but it hasn't worked
out that way.  Unfortunately, many people have strong
convictions about how other people should live.

	Whether the reductions in consumption caused by an oil cutoff
are regarded as permanent or temporary affects the available choices
in dealing with the shortages.  To the extent that they are regarded
as permanent, long term measures like reversing the moves to the
suburbs are appropriate.  Also it becomes important to avoid
mechanisms other than price for enforcing frugality, because they
will lead to permanent distortions of the economy.
Moreover, issues of equity will be divisive, since people will
believe that their long term interests are at stake.

	If the restrictions are regarded as temporary, non-economic
measures such as rationing will be better accepted and will last
longer before distorting economic decisions.

	An oil cutoff will require an industrial mobilization like that at the
beginning of World War II.  However, getting agreement on crash programs
won't be so easy as it was then.  No-one opposed President Roosevelt's
call for producing 50,000 airplanes and the plans for a synthetic rubber
industry.  The atomic bomb project was kept secret with the consent of the
few Congressmen who were told about it.  However, it is likely that there
will be determined opposition to what has to be done to survive an oil
cutoff, because such opposition follows from ideologies already strongly
entrenched.

	Perhaps it will seem unnecessarily contentious and
provocative to discuss ideology in a paper concerned with a national
crisis.  Rather than stir up contention, maybe it would be better
to stick to a discussion of what should be done and omit remarks
that may be offensive to people whose support may be obtainable.

	The purpose of this discussion of ideology is not
to support the measures I advocate by attacking the motives of
potential opponents.  Ideology is a social phenomenon that can be
studied scientifically like any other, and it is relevant to do
it here, because ideology is the main obstacle to solving our
present energy problems and is likely to be the main obstacle to
solving the problems posed by an oil cutoff.

	To a substantial body of opinion, the impossibility and
indeed the undesirability of
American energy independence,
the pejorative word for which is "autarchy", is an article of
faith.  An early but typical
expression of this point of view is Russell Train's
%2"We can and should seize upon the energy crisis as a good excuse and
great opportunity for making some very fundamental changes that we
should be making anyhow for other reasons."%1,
%2Science%1 184 p. 1050, 7 June 1974.

	Some scientists and engineers try to take values
and ideology into account in technological planning but do
it in a way that seems to me mistaken.  They treat
protests against technology as a side-effect determined
by the technology itself - just as S0%42%1 is a side-effect
of burning coal in certain ways.

	I think it is also a mistake to regard the anti-technology
movement as an interest group whose members personally benefit
from holding back technology.  Since the movement is quick
to accuse others of acting solely in their own self interest,
it is pleasant to turn the tables sometimes and accuse Sierra
Club members of trying to hold down the masses, but this isn't
really their main motivation.  They have a genuine, though mainly
mistaken, concept of the public interest.

	Scientific study of protests against technology is
certainly necessary, but the above approaches seem to miss
the fact that ideological movements
are dynamic entities with
histories.  We can use the engineering analogy of hysteresis;
protest isn't merely determined by what technology is attempted but
also by the history of the protest movement.  Relevant factors include

.item←0
	#. The alliance of anti-technology with the radical left formed
during the Vietnam war 

	#. The role of the movement as a vehicle
for political advancement and as a claim on political power,

	#. Its institutionalization in the academic, media and
government worlds

	#. Its ways of recruiting new adherents through the prevalence
of anti-technological attitudes among school teachers.

	#. Connection with technological romanticism of solar and
"appropriate" technology and the Brownian space movement.

	#. Social romanticism concerning small communities and other
temptations to redesign society.

	#. Obsequiousness in the academic and industrial communities
to the intellectual fads of Government officials.

	Of course, this isn't a complete list of comparable items.

	Viewing anti-technology as a movement rather than simply
as a reaction of the public to the effects of technology gives different
expectations about the effect of a concession to its views.  On
the simple reaction model, we should expect that a concession will
cause a lessening of protests.  On the movement model, the situation
is much more complicated.  Some leaders, fearing a decline in their
organization, may intensify the level of protest, while others
are in a position to compromise.

	Another effect is that many public figures cannot react to
proposals as individuals but must react as representatives of groups with
positions and alliances with other groups.  Since frequently the most
extreme positions attract the best activists, the "moderates" usually
won't disagree with them.

.skip 2
RATIONING AND OTHER FORMS OF ALLOCATION

	Allocations based on a percentage of pre-existing use and preserving
pre-existing channels of supply can work for a short time.  Their virtue
may be that they can postpone the burst of inflation, hoarding and
unstable prices that an immediate scarcity handled only by pricing
may bring.  There will inevitably be anomalies because of recent
changes in situation.  The suffering they cause can be borne, or it
can be alleviated by ad hoc decisions of the allocation authorities.

	The following longer term problems make it necessary to replace
allocations by a price mechanism after a relatively small number of
months:

	1. An increasing number of supplyees undergo changes in their
situations.  Some will need more and will appeal.  Judging these appeals
will take more and more expertise as they come to involve long term
changes in the activities of individuals and businesses.  An ideal
allocator might have to know as much about the business to which he
is allocating as its owners in addition to knowing the supply situation.
Such expertise will be in short supply and better spent in production
than in allocation.  Those whose activities change to requiring less for a given
level of sacrifice will be inclined to keep quiet, and ferreting them
out will again consume administrative resources and lead to all kinds
of conflicts.  Permitting the sale of allocations after a while will
relieve the situation, but if continued, economic positions will develop
based mainly on the possession of allocations.
These economic positions will distort the economy.

	A priority system in which prices are determined by a market
covering more than half the supplies but where essential users get
priorities to buy at that price will work for a long time provided
the number of supplyees with priorities is kept small enough.

	2. Temporary individual rationing of gasoline and heating
oil may be required.  Thus during World War II anyone could get an
A-sticker permitting the purchase
of xxx gallons per month.  Only A coupons could be
used to buy gas that was to be put into a car with an A sticker.
Commuters to essential jobs could get stickers and coupons worth
more.  A recent Administration plan calls for an allowance of
42 gallons per month.

	There is also a
danger is that in an attempt to achieve consensus, plans will be
adopted that are too elaborate to be administered, cause long
procedural delays, contain built-in vetoes for various groups, and
give people wrong incentives.  For example, there may be incentives
to consume lest a quota be lost and to heat unused space or drive
unneeded vehicles.  An industry of fixers may develop.

	While I have accepted rationing as a way of avoiding
oscillations in supply and price at the onset of a crisis, I must
confess being impressed by Alvin Alm's arguments that rationing
is unlikely to work even in the short run.


.skip 2
POLITICAL ACTIONS IN SUPPORT OF MOBILIZATION

	The oil cutoff will cause many politicians and environmentalists
to change their positions and support energy production measures and
support assurances to the population that production will solve the
problem.  However, there will remain "men of principle" who will
hold out against any relaxation of procedural and substantive
constraints.  Those environmentalists whose positions change will
be reluctant to disagree publicly with their extremist colleagues,
because these will often have been the greatest contributors to
the cause.  Therefore, the President will have to attack the
extremists publicly, not just in one speech, but repeatedly.

	One of the problems is that today, unlike in December 1941,
there is substantial intellectual lobby whose slogan is %2"It can't
be done"%1.  Its intellectual source is in the environmental movement
which believes it shouldn't be done.

	Perhaps the greatest contribution this conference can make
to our preparedness for an oil cutoff is a clear statement that it
can be done.  With an effort on the scale of the World War II crash
programs, we can restore our standard of living with our own
unaided efforts and even keep our allies afloat (given their best
efforts too).

	Of course, the probability of a cutoff can be greatly reduced
by a crash program of energy production starting now.  The figures
mentioned at this conference of α$270 billion to α$450 billion to replace
9 million barrels per day of
oil imports by production from shale are less than the predicted cost to
our economy of a single year of cutoff.  Proposing to achieve this level
of production in 30 years rather than in five to ten seems to me to
be a consequence of intimidation by the vehemence of the anti-energy
activists.  Anyone who seriously regards the energy crisis as the moral
equivalent of war should support solving it at a cost of two to five years'
defense budget.

	According to the press, there is no official contingency
plan for dealing with an oil cutoff.  Time and resources could be saved
in an emergency by having a good plan.  However, time and resources
can be wasted in an emergency by a commitment to a bad plan.  Perhaps
my worry is unrealistic, but it may be that a plan prepared now
would be worse than no plan, because it would be a compromise with the
views of people who oppose increased energy production now.

	More research would permit a more quantitative discussion
of the problems of an oil cutoff.  However, I suspect that should
anyone come across this paper some years after a cutoff, he will
be less annoyed at the lack of numbers than at the lack of imagination
in determining the qualitative consequences of the cutoff and the
responses to it.

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.skip 2
John McCarthy
Computer Science Department
Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305
.if false then begin

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